LET’S AGAIN

,OK so let’s see if the third time is the charm.

On Oct. 14, 2014, I wrote in this column that our local student-athletes deserved field turf – a piece which generated thousands of hits and which many coaches tell me helped start the conversation about bringing change to our area’s playing fields.

But the conversation was just that – all talk.

The topic fizzed and never amounted to action.

This, of course, led to a second column – this one on Sept. 27, 2016, which was more pointed.

In this piece, I said that the lack of turf in the area was embarrassing, adding that it was a health and safety issue and a plague that was literally endangering the student-athletes in this area.

This piece helped get us halfway there.

It actually was brought up during school board discussion, and coaches in the area have thanked me several times for laying out the issue in a public platform and giving an opinion that is on their side.

In April, Lafourche Parish voters renewed an existing facility millage, which school board members promised would go to laying down turf at the parish’s three public high schools – South Lafourche, Central Lafourche and Thibodaux. E.D. White already has a field of its own – the only team in the area with the luxury.

From what I’m hearing, school administrators are being told that the 2017 football season will be the last in Lafourche played on natural grass – a victory in the longstanding fight.

According to present plans, the fields will be dug up after the 2018 track season and laid down in time for the 2018 football season – though with the rain we get every summer, I’ll believe it when I see it. Now, I’m attempting to further nudge and push the enve-

lope further along. It’s time for Terrebonne Parish to find a way to do the same.

It’s time for school board members, coaches and everyone else passionate on the topic to lock themselves in a room and refuse to leave until a solution is created.

Because if not, the problem is only going to get worse. Gang, I’m incredibly worried about the 2017 football season. I’ve been doing this job since December 2009.

That means that this is my eighth football season working sports for this paper. This is far and away the wettest, soggiest summer I can remember in my time here.

It rains every, single day – so much so that I’ve literally had scheduling difficulty in creating our football preview guides because it’s hard to get photos of all of the schools through all of the scheduling delays and practice cancellations.

When it doesn’t rain, it’s still hard for some teams to get outside because the fields are waterlogged and unable to be used.

It’s not an issue that’s highly publicized yet because no one reports on high school practices.

But if this weather pattern does not soon change, we’re going to be in for one hell of a ride this fall.

Our local fields cannot handle the amount of usage they’re asked to handle – especially not given the rain we receive.

Between high school football, PE classes, middle school football, marching bands, soccer, track and field and everything else, the grass is literally exhausted until it taps out and dies.

I use this stat all the time, but Central Lafourche coach Keith Menard has been a huge champion of this cause since it’s hit the presses. He said a natural grass expert told him that our area’s fields (given the type of grass, precipitation and drainage) should only host 12 athletic contests a year. He said the expert added that 15-20 is doable, but is pushing it. At Central Lafourche High School, the football field hosts upwards of 50 contests per year. “It’s a recipe that’s never going to work,” Menard said. And in Terrebonne, it’s even worse because we have just two public stadiums which are shared by four varsity teams. That strains the fields even more. An ideal fix would be to give H.L. Bourgeois their own stadium – something they deserve, considering that they have the biggest enrollment of any local high school in the area.

But given the budget climate, we all know that’s not going to happen.

But turf is more realistic. And cheaper, too, over the long haul – once the expenses are paid.

It’s time. It’s been time. And there’s no time like the present.

This is a safety issue and it’s an issue that affects every, single student who uses the fields – not just football players. Last year, the fields in one local game got so slick and dangerous that several players were injured, and coaches on both sides said field conditions were to blame.

That’s unacceptable and inexcusable.

Lafourche sees that and is in the process of fixing it. It’s time Terrebonne does the same.

Because if the weather pattern doesn’t change in a hurry, this season is going to be an awfully tough one to bare.

LET’S AGAINLET’S AGAIN